Review: Monitor tablets – Yiynova

I hope you’re doing well. I’ve longly wanted to post about my loyal Yiynova tablet monitor, and now that I’m about to give it a huge rest after 4 years of use, it’s time to talk about the performance of this chinese tablet monitor. (I just purchased Huion KAMVAS gt-191, I will made a post in a future about it)

DISCLAIMER: This post is WAY MORE FOCUSED in encourage you to try alternative tablet monitors if you can’t afford Wacom Cintiq than invite you to purchase a Yiynova tablet. We creatives don’t always have the chance to spend +1000$/€ in equipment like this, so trust me: you can work wonders with a cheaper tablet monitor. What REALLY matters is how you use the tools, and your attitude regarding art.

Design made with my Yiynova tablet monitor

As professional, I was used to work with Wacom tablets, being an Intuos 4 the latest one before jumping to a tablet monitor, so a chinese tablet wasn’t the first option I considered back in the days. When I started to do my research to acquire a tablet monitor, I remember the frustration. I had some savings, but Wacom Cintiqs were WAY out of my league. They were insanely expensive (1500-2000€) Ok, I know It would pay off the investment, but I wasn’t eager to spent all my savings in a single tablet because I needed the money and every euro was not easy to earn.

Wacom tablets are a safe bet in most cases (I wasn’t surprisingly so happy with the Cintiq Companion 2, read my review here), BUT as I said, they are quite expensive. So I started to look for alternatives.

That’s how I knew about Yiynova. 4 years ago the tablet monitor market wasn’t that developed, so very few brands were releasing that kind of creative tools in low price but competitive quality, so there was not much to pick from. I checked some reviews in youtube and I finally picked Yiynova MSPU19+.

THE TABLET

DISPLAY: The size is 19”, enough size to work, and the surface is made of glass. That’s something that can bother some users (specially if you come from a Cintiq, with their non-reflectant paper-like surfaces) because it definitely reflects light in some moments. Also, it requires (that’s not very different of any tablet monitor) the use of an smudge glove to make easier the shift over the glass surface. Hands tend to stick more to glass. That was not the big deal to me, and I loved working over the soft, clear glass surface. Glass surface can be found also in Microsoft Surface hybrid tablets. It also showed a dead pixel from time to time, wich wasn’t cool but didn’t bothered me.

Compared to any Cintiq, this tablet lacks of the sturdy quality and finish, but it works wonders, and it’s quite enough to work on a daily base.

PRICE: Back to date, the price was over 650€ plus shipping to Spain for model MSPU19+. It came fast and well packaged. It came without a smudge glove as gift (it looks like it comes with one as gift sometimes).

THE STYLUS: The default stylus has very cheap quality, so I purchased later the upgraded version, with rubber handle and sturdier quality. It’s powered by 1.5 AAA Battery and it lasts a lot.

THE INSTALLATION: It was a bit tricky, but thanx to other artists reviews, I was aware of that. I had to uninstall previous Wacom drivers and then plug on the tablet, installing drivers later.

Be aware that the tablet may not work if connected to a USB hub along other stuff. It requires it own single USB connection.

I replaced the VESA stand for a jointed monitor arm that works wonders in cases of having little space.

It worked well in almost every software I tried it on BUT Illustrator. Beware of that you designers. I had no problem with that, because I used the mouse for working vectors on illustrator and my main software is Phothoshop and Clip Studio.

LAG: Almost unnoticeable. In fact, It isn’t much different from Wacom Cintiq tablet monitors. It gave me lag only when managing insanely large files on my computer, and it worked anyway.

WHY I’M FINALLY GETTING ANOTHER TABLET MONITOR

The power plug started to give some bad connection issues and interferences. After 4 years of use, it was worth the price, it lasted after suffering 3 house movings!!!

PROS:

Affordable

Easy to use

Comfortable

Clear display, good colors

Enough quality to work as professional on daily base

VESA stand that can be replaced with a jointed arm for monitors

Monitor quality looks sturdier than the stylus

CONS:

It doesn’t works with Illustrator

Glass surface

Its surface reflects light sometimes

It has no tilt

Default stylus is definitely cheap and weak. Upgraded version feels way better but needs to be purchased apart.

Yiynova tablets are still being sold through Amazon but Yiynova brand isn’t releasing more drivers to date (last one is from 2016) and its own shop is closed, so it’s unknown if they are still on the bussiness.

I WOULD RECOMMEND IT: Yes, but bear in mind that actually the market has evolved, so you may get a cheaper tablet with more pressure point level and improved specs. Don’t expect a Wacom quality product, but a tablet monitor that works enough well considering the price. Also, the unforeseable fact that they may be out of bussiness makes to think twice the purchase. As I said at the top of this post, I write this post to encourage you to jump out the comfort zone to try other tools like a cheaper tablet if you can’t afford Wacom. My MSPU19+ has been my loyal partner for so long, but now it’s time to say goodbye. I must confess I didn’t missed Wacom products at any point, in spite of having tried Cintiq.

OVERALL RATING: 3 of 5

THANK YOU for reading. Have you tried other monitor tablets? Let me know in comments!